Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure review

Anyone for a game of tag?

Games have been around for so long that these days it's difficult to call anything truly original. But this is something that we definitely haven't seen before: an entire game based around graffiti.

Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and The Warriors both included graffiti tasks, but only in passing. In Getting Up, the only way to succeed is by putting up your pieces of art around the fictional city of New Radius.

Standing in your way are rival artists and cops, who aren't keen to see you redecorating their turf.

Your character, Trane, is a cocky teenager who's decided to quit living at grandma's place and try to make it on the streets. As well as having some skills with a spray can, he's okay with his fists too - and becomes even better as you unlock new combos.

While completing graf tasks is the key to progressing through the levels, the fights with rival crews are satisfying too. Grabbing a bin lid and nailing a baddie over the head never gets dull.

As well as offering loads of different styles of graffiti from tags (where Trane simply writes his name on the wall) right up to wheat-pastes (where you have to stick up huge posters with rude messages written on them), the environments in Getting Up set the scene brilliantly - you feel genuinely claustrophobic in subway tunnels and terrified when overlooking a flyover with a massive drop below you.

By combining clever design with juicy combat and different ways to redecorate New Radius, Marc Ecko has devised a concept that's both hugely original and dangerously addictive. Sorry mum: looks like graffiti is cool after all.

More Info

Genre

Action

Description

This probably won't do for graffiti what the Tony Hawk games did for skateboarding, but it does make it look like a lot of fun.